On December 14, I came across a report on the CNN website titled “Watch Clarissa Ward report from inside Gaza for the first time since war began”, which grabbed my attention, as good headlines usually do. The subheading further heightened my interest – “CNN’s Clarissa Ward witnessed the horror and humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza during a visit to a field hospital in Rafah operated by the United Arab Emirates”.

American journalists had not reported from within Gaza – except a few embedded with Israeli troops – because Israel, as the occupying power in control of the Gaza Strip’s borders, has been denying access to foreign journalists and putting pressure on Egypt to do so as well. So I was intrigued by how Ward had managed to gain access and saw her report as a chance to learn if such on-the-spot coverage would compensate for the broadly awful Western mainstream media coverage of the previous nine weeks.

Over the previous two months, I had observed heavily pro-Israeli, distorted, and incomplete coverage, especially on American television.

I saw most news presenters and show hosts expressing strong bias for Israel, in their words, tone of voice, and editorial choices. The predominance of military analyses by retired US senior officers was equally slanted towards........

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